Matings Mix: Orchestral amongst Yarraman Park residents due a date with Vinnie

Cover image courtesy of Yarraman Park Stud

The home of multiple Champion Sire I Am Invincible, Yarraman Park Stud have spent decades cultivating the kind of broodmare band to support not just a stallion of his calibre, but to prime his son Hellbent to follow in his footsteps and to give Brave Smash (Jpn) the best launchpad possible to achieve success.

I Am Invincible both receives the cream of their broodmare band and is also the progenitor of some of their best prospects, and it is with this in mind that they carefully select where their mares go this spring.

Valuable Vinnie daughters

While it means many of their mares have to travel outside of Yarraman Park’s gates, the farm has continued to invest heavily in daughters of I Am Invincible to join their broodmare band.

“These Champion sires tend to go on and make Champion broodmare sires,” said Matt Scown, Yarraman Park Stud’s general manager. “So we have been trying to collect as many I Am Invincible mares as possible. He's already making his mark as a broodmare sire with the Group 1 winners Kimochi and Asfoora, so there are really exciting things for him to come. The more of his daughters we can get, the better.”

Afterlight (I Am Invincible), a four-time winning daughter of G2 VRC Sires' Produce Stakes winner Twilight Royale (Testa Rossa) and a half-sister to G2 Sandown Guineas winner Serasana (Snitzel), will visit Tentyris for her third season at stud. She has produced a yearling colt by Alabama Express and a filly by Harry Angel (Ire) this spring.

“She’s a beautiful Vinnie mare that we paid a lot of money for,” Yarraman Park Director Arthur Mitchell said. “We thought she would really suit Tentyris and produce a good type with him. We make a lot of our matches on type, moreso than anything else.”

“She’s an outstanding physical,” said Scown. “We paid $500,000 for her with a really good client of ours from the race fillies section of the Magic Millions broodmare sale in 2024. Being by I Am Invincible was a huge tick for us.”

The mating to Tentyris was an easy decision.

“We bought a breeding right in Tentyris when he went to stud,” Scown said. “We loved him as a racehorse. He was a gun 2-year-old trained on to be an elite 3-year-old.

“We have put this mare to two proven Group 1-producing stallions for her first two foals and she has done a great job. The Alabama Express colt will go to either Magic Millions or Inglis Easter, and the Harry Angel filly is a very nice type. She is producing the right types, so we can send her to a first season sire now.”

Another Vinnie mare in the herd is the Listed winner and Group performer Festivity (NZ), who has travelled south to visit Toronado (Ire).

“She’s another Vinnie mare that we love, and her first foal, a colt by Snitzel, sold for $625,000 at Magic Millions, then we have retained her Snitzel filly to race with our partner in the mare,” Scown said. Sir David Ellis (BAFNZ), Te Akau Racing, and Kia Ora Stud outlaid the $625,000 for Rise To Power (Snitzel), Festivity’s first foal, and took him back to New Zealand.

“She has a Stay Inside colt that will go to the Magic Millions yearling sale in January next year, so she is off to a great start,” Scown said. “She actually ticked her first scan positive to Toronado today, so we are really happy with that too.

“It’s a similar cross to Masked Crusader, a Group 1 winner by Toronado out of an Invincible Spirit mare. Toronado gets speed and precocity, as we have seen with JJ Atkins winner Tron Bolt, and they train on to be elite older horses as well.”

Only the very best for Vinnie

With I Am Invincible now 22, his book is restricted to a smaller number of mares, but mostly what this means is that the quality of mares visiting him is more concentrated. Bred and initially raced by Dorrington Farm’s Robert Crabtree, Floozie (Zoustar) was a private purchase for the farm and has been one who has earned permanent residency in I Am Invincible’s book.

“She’s a Group-winning mare by Zoustar and she is out of a Group 1-winning mare from a good family,” said Mitchell. “We bought her and kept her in training to get her Group 2, and she has had a very nice I Am Invincible colt this year.”

A daughter of G1 Blue Diamond Stakes winner Catchy (Fastnet Rock), Floozie won the G2 Dane Ripper Stakes in the Yarraman Park colours before retiring to stud with two stakes wins amongst her six victories.

“She is one of our very best mares,” Scown said. “She’s by a Champion sire, out of a Group 1-winning Fastnet Rock mare, and she’s a Group 2 winner herself. When she retired to stud last year, she went straight to I Am Invincible as an obvious mating for us. The first foal, an I Am Invincible colt, is very, very good, so no brainer to go back to him. I think she is going to make an A class broodmare.”

Another mare who has earned her spot is Hypothetical (Pride Of Dubai), who was purchased as a yearling by Mitchell Bloodstock (FBAA) for $310,000 at the Inglis Premier Yearling Sale. The granddaughter of G1 Champagne Stakes winner Carry On Cutie (More Than Ready {USA}) won six times up to Listed level and was beaten a whisker by Queman (Mint Lane {USA}) in the G1 Oakleigh Plate.

“Her first foal is by Vinnie and he is clearly tailor-made for her physically from what we have seen so it’s another no-brainer to send her back to him,” said Scown. “She's done a remarkable job on the racetrack, she's just a top class mare, and she will be married to I Am Invincible.”

Also going back to I Am Invincible in 2026 will be Lubiton (Snitzel), dam of $5.6 million Inglis Chairman’s Sale topper Chayan (I Am Invincible), and juvenile Listed winner Quality Response (USA) (Quality Road {USA}), whose first two foals by I Am Invincible have made $420,000 and $875,000 respectively in the ring.

Champions on champions

G3 Triscay Stakes winner Po Kare Kare (NZ), a daughter of Champion New Zealand Sire Savabeel, has also earned a return ticket to the champion off of the quality of her first foal, who will be aimed at one of the top yearling sales in 2027.

“We paid $750,000 for her off the track and she is an outstanding physical specimen,” said Scown. “That's how much we loved her and that love remains the same. Her first foal by I Am Invincible is a very, very good quality, classy colt, as you can imagine. She is due to foal to Too Darn Hot any day and then she will go back to Vinnie off the quality of that first foal.”

Po Kare Kare boasts a particularly strong female family that has also produced the likes of G1 TJ Smith Stakes winner Chain Of Lightning (Haradasun), Champion 3YO Racing To Win (Encosta De Lago), and Everest winner Classique Legend (Not A Single Doubt).

“We have really high hopes for her, being by Savabeel,” Scown said. “We love collecting these mares by Champion sires. They give us a really good feeling.”

Another daughter of Savabeel resides at the farm and will also head to I Am Invincible this season, and that is Orchestral (NZ). The winner of the G1 New Zealand Derby and the G1 Vinery Stud Stakes has been retained by her racing ownership to visit the champion for her first season at stud.

“It’s exciting to have her here,” said Scown. “It's very rare to get these types of mares coming through your door and to have a champion of her generation who won over $2.5 million in prize money here is very special. She’s an A plus physical type, and she has the pedigree and the race record to succeed.”

Owned by Colin and Helen Litt, Orchestral comes from one of New Zealand’s strongest families; a half to her dam produced Champion 3YO Savaglee (NZ), who stands his first season at Mapperly Stud this year, while the close family has also produced fellow Champion 3YOs Daffodil (NZ) (No Excuse Needed) and Aegon (NZ) (Sacred Falls {NZ}), as well as multiple Group 1 winner Atishu (NZ) (Savabeel) and G1 Sir Rupert Clarke Stakes winner Sepals (Calyx {GB}).

For Orchestral's connections, it was an easy decision to choose which champion to kick off their champion's broodmare career with.

“Speaking to Colin and Helen when they retired her from the racetrack, I think Vinnie was hard to go past for them,” said Scown. “I think she’s perfect for him. We will be very excited to see the resulting foal next year.”

Table: 2026 mating plans for some of Yarraman Park Stud and their clients' broodmare band